El Paso is a city in and the county seat of El Paso County, Texas, United States, and part of the American Southwest. According to the United States Census Bureau's 2006 population estimates, the city had a population of 606,913. It is the sixth-largest city in Texas and the [[List of United States cities by population|22nd-largest city] Its metropolitan area covers all of El Paso County. The metropolitan area has a population of 736,310.
El Paso stands on the Rio Grande (RÃo Bravo del Norte), across the border from Ciudad Juárez. The image to the right, showing Downtown El Paso and Juárez, with the Juárez Mountains in the background, shows how the cities are conjoined. The two cities form a combined Metropolitan Area with Juarez being the significantly larger of the two have a combined population of 2,049,648, with Juárez accounting for 2/3 of the Metro population.
El Paso is home to the University of Texas at El Paso (founded in 1914 as The Texas State School of Mines and Metallurgy). Fort Bliss, a major United States Army installation, lies to the east and northeast of the city, extending north up to the White Sands Missile Range. The Franklin Mountains extend into El Paso from the north and nearly divide the city into two sections, with downtown connecting the two sections at the south end of the mountain range. |
